


blood in the water

by moonstruckmidnight



Series: shadow triad 2.0 [2]
Category: League of Legends
Genre: Child Abuse, Dysfunctional Family, Emotional/Psychological Abuse, Gen, Marcus du Couteau's A+ Parenting, Physical Abuse, To the Max, Whipping, Whump, and, as usual no one goes to the doctor, attempted fratricide for fun and profit (and the general's approval), i guess maybe it could be, okay heavy ones first, we have the range, when you don't kill your sister so your adoptive dad makes her fuck you up
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-02
Updated: 2021-02-02
Packaged: 2021-03-12 09:47:08
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,030
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28883388
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/moonstruckmidnight/pseuds/moonstruckmidnight
Summary: The newest du Coteau meets the youngest du Coteau. Despite someone’s best attempts, there is no fratricide.
Relationships: Katarina Du Couteau & Talon Du Couteau, Katarina du Couteau & General Marcus du Couteau
Series: shadow triad 2.0 [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1946737
Comments: 6
Kudos: 9





	blood in the water

Katarina meets him in Noxus.

She has no idea who he is, of course. She’s tired and aching and her fingers won’t properly curl because of the hit her teacher had landed on them, and she’s not paying much attention to the boy with the hood in the corner of the Bloody Axe tavern, looking distinctly suspicious in the way all nightsharps are but not like an imminent threat.

  
The General had taught her that. There’s three kinds of people in Noxus: people who threaten, people who are threats, and people who are threatened. The General is the first. Katarina is the second. The boy in the corner is the third.

She heads up to the bar at the front. Eyes rise to her and fall away as soon as they do—Katarina’s a regular here, and she’s more than proved herself to everyone in the bar. The boy doesn’t stop staring. Katarina doesn’t care. She can handle whatever he throws at her.

“The usual,” she says when the barkeep, a buff warrior with long hair and two missing fingers, gets close enough to hear. “...make it spicy,” she adds after a moment’s thought. “Today’s been rough.”

More information than necessary, but Katarina is tired and gives no shits about whether or not the cook poisons her food. She’s survived the General, is still surviving him, and that’s given her a mostly-decent poison tolerance. They nod and head to the back to inform the cook, and Katarina settles in to wait.

Or at least, she was  _ going to  _ before she saw the boy again.

He’s  _ still  _ staring, not even making an attempt to hide it. Dark eyes glint under the shadows of his hood, dramatic and sweeping. It’s probably the most remarkable part of his attire, tattered fabric falling in a point over his eyes.

Katarina has no idea how his visibility isn’t shit. It’s a cloak, it’s heavy and cumbersome and the hood will just cut off his peripherals. It makes for a more intimidating first impression, sure, but it doesn’t even look like there’s a way to tear it off if an enemy gets a fist in it.

Katarina officially hates that fucking cloak. (And also the boy under it, because he  _ fucking bought it  _ and also won’t stop staring or at least have the decency to do it subtly, but that’s implied and also besides the point.)

The thing is, despite the name, there’s no fighting allowed in the Bleeding Axe. The owner has a strict no-blood policy, because apparently  _ it’s annoying to get out of the flooring  _ and _ they aren’t catering to the underbelly here,  _ so if Katarina wants to get into a brawl with the boy, she has to do it outside. And fact of the matter is, she’s too run-down to ignore the numbing exhaustion making a home in her bones, the burn of overused muscles in her abs and legs. So with one last look at Cloak Boy, she turns to the counter just as the barkeep sets her food down in front of her.

And that should be that.

_ But it isn’t.  _ Apparently, no one taught cloak boy any fucking manners, because he fucking  _ walks over. _

Or. Well. She doesn’t recall  _ seeing  _ him walking. More like she blinked and then he was taking a seat next to her, moving folds of his stupid  _ fucking  _ cloak to better accomodate himself. It’s weird, that’s what it is, and she has no time for weird.

“What,” she says, voice flat. She keeps one of her daggers at hand, obvious enough that he’d have to be utterly oblivious not to notice, angles herself away, doesn’t look at him in favor of the food in front of her—all  _ very  _ clear fuck off signs, as taught to her by the General  _ and  _ Cass, so they couldn’t be uninterpreted, especially not by a nightsharp. And yet, Cloak Boy does not fuck off. 

Idiot. Katarina could kill him and it wouldn’t even take  _ effort. _

...well. She didn’t see him coming. That… might be an issue.

(How do you fight an opponent you can’t even see?)   


“Katarina du Couteau,” says Cloak Boy. His voice is rusty with disuse, cracks as he talks. Katarina’s lip curls with a sneer.

“If you know that, why are you talking to me?” she snaps. “Leave me the fuck alone.”

The barkeep is watching, eyes sharp. Katarina flicks them a glance. She’s not planning on causing trouble, but she isn’t going to shy away from it if it comes. 

“Are you really worth his time?” The words are quiet, but there’s an undercut of iron fury just under them. Katarina tenses. She doesn’t need to ask who he’s talking about—there’s only really one person who would qualify.

“The General doesn’t waste his time,” bites Katarina, low and lethal. She meets Cloak Boy’s eyes as she says, “And I can  _ show you  _ just how worthy I am.”

His eyes are flinty under the hood, judging. Katarina wants to knock his teeth down his fucking  _ throat. _

“You’re not enough,” he hisses, barely audible. “You think you deserve him just because you’re his daughter but you’re  _ wrong.  _ He knows he deserves better than you can give him and he’s found it _ ,  _ and he’ll forget about you.”

Katarina snarls. “Who do you think you  _ are?” _

The boy smirks. It sits awkwardly on his face, lips cracking, but it’s unsettlingly familiar. “Better than you.”

Katarina shoves to her feet. The chair clatters behind her, but she doesn’t care. Leaning into Cloak Boy’s space, she growls, “Then prove it _ , nightsharp.” _

“Hey.” A hand thumps down on the table between them as Talon’s entire face twists into a snarl, and Katarina jerks backwards. It’s the barkeep, doing her job of keeping people from fighting in the establishment. Katarina wants to challenge them but  _ knows  _ that she’ll fail, that she’s not strong enough. Cloak Boy’s glaring at her, and all her face contorts as she scowls back.

“Take it outside,” says the barkeep, utterly uncompromising. Katarina reluctantly turns her attention to them.

_ “He  _ approached  _ me,”  _ she snaps. “Shouldn’t you be throwing  _ him _ out?”

The barkeep shrugs, unmoved. “If you guys are fighting, I’ll throw the both of you out. I don’t care. No fighting in the building.”   
  
“Fine,” bites Katarina, mutinous, and she turns back to Cloak Boy—   
  
But he’s gone.

Cloak Boy is  _ fucking gone,  _ and Katarina has no idea where he’s gone, and she fucking hates him so much. She spins back to the barkeep. “Where did he go?”

The barkeep shrugs. “Disappeared. Not my problem.” They tip their head down at the plate, still sitting on the bar. “You finishing this?”

Katarina has never wanted to eat flame flake cakes less in her  _ life. _

She turns and stalks out without another word. The eyes of the other patrons are on her back the whole way out.

-

Katarina meets him again in the manor hall.

Well— _ meet _ is a strong word. If Katarina were a lesser warrior, she wouldn’t have managed to dodge the drop from the ceiling, or the knife that flashes out immediately after. She rolls, gets a knee under her and launches backwards as a dagger lodges itself in the floor by her head—cracks the marble, cleaves through it like butter, fuck, she can’t let that touch her—and draws her weapons as she slams upright.

Her attacker comes at her in a burst of speed. Katarina dodges, gets a handful of fabric from their trailing—cloak—?

_ “You,”  _ Katarina growls as Cloak Boy turns to face her. He just snarls worldlessly and goes for—fuck, how many knives does he carry? She smacks it out of his hand before slamming her knee into his solar plexus—

But he’s… not there?

Katarina wheezes as a slam to the back knocks the wind out of her, spinning with the momentum to get away from—air? No, fuck, he’s invisible, isn’t he. She knew she should’ve tried figuring how to fight an invisible opponent out earlier—

A swish through the air, and Katarina skitters back, brings up a blade on instinct to block, and—

It hits something. Flesh. Only the flat of her blade, but the boy shimmers back into existence and Katarina  _ pounces,  _ knives between her fingers, as she slams into him—   
  
“That’s  _ enough.” _

All the air leaves Katarina’s lungs. She freezes in place for a moment before her brain fully processes the words and not just the voice, the tone, and then she’s scrambling back, sheathing her knives and crossing her hands behind her back. Cloak Boy remains prone on the floor, barely breathing.

“Katarina,” says the General, and she can see him now, walking towards her from the hall’s entrance. “You had a good reaction time.”   
  
He… complimented her? Katarina can’t help the grin that tugs at her lips even as she ducks her head both in thanks and to hide it. “Thank you, sir,” she says. 

“However, you were sloppy. It was only luck that let you detect where he was.” The General’s lip curls in disdain. The happiness building in Katarina’s chest is immediately squashed, throat tightening as she nods.

“I’ll be better next time, sir,” she says, but he’s already moving on, gaze turned to Cloak Boy. For a moment, she wants to call him back, apologize, prove that she can do more than this, but she knows better than to interrupt the General.

“Talon,” he starts, and, oh, wow, is that  _ really  _ his name? God, how much more dramatic could he be,  _ Talon.  _ Ridiculous. “I’m disappointed in you.”

Oh. Oh,  _ fuck.  _ Katarina has only been on the receiving end of the General’s disappointment once, but… it’s not an experience she’s likely to forget any time soon. She’s hyper-aware of the too-slow slide of her left eyelid, the way the eye under it can’t quite translate the rich red of the General’s cloak as he sweeps past her.

“I’m sorry,” rasps Cloak Boy—no,  _ Talon _ , and he goes to push himself off the ground but the General puts his steel-plated boots on his fingers and he goes still. Katarina’s breath stutters in her throat. Everyone knows how important a nightsharp’s hands are—you can’t steal with broken fingers, you can’t fight with slow hands, and the General is threatening to let this boy die a slow, starving death. Talon’s eyes are wide, and Katarina can see the whites of them even half-shadowed by his hood. Her skull aches, eye socket sears like it’s being fractured all over again, but—   
  
Isn’t this what he deserves?   
  
Isn’t this what happens to failures?

Talon didn’t kill her, didn’t subdue her like was  _ probably  _ his task, and that makes him a failure, and failures don’t get to stand in the du Couteau house. (Failures don’t get to  _ see  _ in the du Couteau house.)   


The General crouches, lowers himself, but he’s still so much  _ bigger  _ than Talon, than her, and Katarina sees the way that sheer panic appears on his face before he slams down on it, hides the weakness as if the General hadn’t seen it the moment it appeared.

The General smiles, sharp and wide, a shark-smile for spilling blood. “Have you ever been  _ whipped,  _ nightsharp?”   
  
Katarina can’t help her startled inhale. Luckily, it’s not loud enough to be an interruption—she wouldn’t want to draw the General’s ire in general, and especially not when he’s  _ disappointed.  _ But still—whipping.  _ Fuck. _

She’s seen the whip. Clean, because of course it is, with fragments of bone and steel embedded in the leather. Katarina’s never earned it, never  _ will,  _ but she doesn’t need much imagination to picture how it’d rip shreds off someone’s back, tear their muscles into strings,  _ wreck them.  _ It’s enough to know she should avoid it _.  _

And Talon’s about her size.

Soon, she won’t need  _ any  _ imagination to picture the whip's work.

“...no,” says Talon, and his eyes are wide, face pale. Katarina knows he’s picturing it too. For a moment, she thinks he might try to protest, but he apparently has self-preservation instincts and shuts his mouth. His eyes drop to the floor, and he retreats into his cloak and says nothing.

“Then brace yourself,” says the General mildly, and then stands up. He turns back to Katarina, who stiffens, lifts her chin, settles her weight more evenly on her feet because the General’s attention is nothing to be  _ casual  _ about, nothing to bear with anything less than perfection. (Perfection which she can’t achieve. Not  _ yet.) _

“Katarina, come here,” he says, and Katarina goes, because she is a good daughter, a good soldier, because she doesn’t  _ disappoint  _ the General. She stops by his side. Talon stiffens with every step towards him she takes.

Katarina looks at the General. He looks back; the smile drops. She isn’t sure whether this makes her feel better or worse.

“Go get the whip,” he says. “You’re going to be the one using it.”

She’s—   
  
What?

“I’ve never—” she starts, but the General  _ frowns  _ and Katarina’s teeth click together before she consciously has to think about it.

“I didn’t think I needed to remind you that  _ you  _ weren’t at your best either,” he says, low and dangerous, and Katarina jerks her head in a nod. Right. She was  _ sloppy.  _ The reminder burns. The General  _ looks  _ at her, and Katarina barely manages to keep from shaking. He’s so big, and he’s right there, and he’s already  _ disappointed  _ if not at her. She has to be  _ careful  _ if she wants to get out in the same condition, and she’s already talked back. Why is she such an  _ idiot? _

“Go get the whip,” he says, quiet but no less commanding for it, and Katarina’s gone before he finishes blinking.

It’s in the armory, the coiled weight of it heavy in Katarina’s hands. For a moment, she sees it drenched in blood, muscle tissue speared on the sharp points, before she blinks it away. She doesn’t have the time to think about the aftermath of what she’s obviously going to see.

Getting back to the hall takes simultaneously too long and not long enough. Talon’s lost his cloak, his shirt, and is hunched, shivering, over his knees. Nowhere to brace himself. Katarina stands over him, whip unfurled, and can count the narrow bones of his ribcage.

This is the Noxus ideal. Standing over someone you’ve bested and proving your strength. (So why does it feel so much like powerlessness, bile in the back of her throat, sweaty hands and trembling fingers?)

“Go ahead, Katarina,” says the General, leaning against a stark white pillar. His eyes are cold. “I’ll tell you when to stop.”   
  
Katarina—   
  
Katarina is an obedient daughter. She does as she’s told.

She doesn’t remember how long it takes. How many lashes she gives. Her left arm gave out, at some point, but the General didn’t say to stop, so she switched to her right. The hits were weaker. The General didn’t comment but Katarina knows he noticed.

Talon probably didn’t.

By the time she’s done, he’s silent. He’d gone quiet after a while, just laid limp and unmoving as the whip cracked down again and again. As  _ Katarina  _ cracked the whip down again and again. His back is… ugly. Strips of skin torn off entirely, shredded muscle glistening underneath. Blood pools under him, pouring from the gashes in his back. Katarina isn’t even sure he’s breathing.

The General pushes himself off the pillar. He’s still not smiling. Steel eyes examine the scene and then flick up to Katarina.   
  
“Clean him up,” he orders with a jerk of his chin. “Make sure you get the blood. I don’t need him for a while but I want him functional.”

Katarina nods stiffly. The General leaves with a whoosh of cloth and clank of steel. Then it’s just Katarina and Talon, standing there in the hall. Or. Katarina’s the only one standing. Talon’s still in his collapsed huddle. Which she did to him. And she is happy about, because she subdued her enemy and satisfied the General, and she is Noxus, all the way through.

She  _ is  _ happy about it.

Katarina doesn’t realize she’s still holding the whip until it drops from her hand, lands with a thump on the floor. There’s blood crusted along the leather, dripping off the shards of bone and fragments of steel. She’s going to have to clean that, she notes, a little absent, if she doesn’t want it to rust.

(She doesn’t acknowledge how that idea makes something turn in her stomach. How she has to swallow down more bile. Her skin crawls at the thought, but she won’t analyze it. She’s an obedient daughter.)

Katarina kicks Talon in the side, not-gentle but not-rough, either. He’s probably already learned that she’s superior after that. Knows his place on the food chain. He  _ is  _ a nightsharp, after all. He doesn’t rouse, even when she does it again with more force.

“C’mon,” she says under her breath, squinting at Talon’s prone form. “Do something.”

Talon doesn’t do anything. When Katarina drops to one knee and puts the polished surface of her knife under his nose, the steel fogs up, which is really the only indicator that he’s still alive.

He’s so—

It’s. Unsettling. When Katarina looks at him. If his hair was red—his blood’s in it but it’s just red-black and sticky—and he was any less scrawny...

Katarina does not think about how easy it would be to fail the General, how easy it would be for her to miss the bar he always sets so high, because to do that is to admit weakness and Katarina is not  _ weak. _

But she can’t get the picture of Talon on the floor from behind her eyelids.

It won’t happen to her. She’s better than Talon, better than a street rat, a nightsharp. She has to believe that. Katarina is not a disappointment—she is the General’s pride.

She can be better.

She will be better.

She  _ is _ better.

The General will not do this to her. He’ll never want to do it to her, because she’ll be better than Talon, won’t disappoint him. He won’t— hurt her.

(Right?)

**Author's Note:**

> me writing the first scene: ah the sweet scent of sibling hatred  
> me writing the second scene: [traumatized skipper madagascar]


End file.
